


Submersus

by MaraudingManaged



Series: Maraudings and Wanderings [5]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Blood and Gore, Blood and Violence, Coercion, Dark, Gen, Graphic Description, Heavy Angst, Horror, Imperius, Isolation, Mind Control, Mind Manipulation, Murder, Murder by Proxy, Other, POV Second Person, Psychological Horror, Psychological Torture, Self-Harm, Self-Loathing, Self-Mutilation, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-09
Updated: 2019-10-09
Packaged: 2020-11-28 09:42:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,297
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20964443
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MaraudingManaged/pseuds/MaraudingManaged
Summary: You have heard the whisper in your mind for what you think might be months, now.You think you might recognise it… but every moment the name comes upon you, it has slipped through your fingers like water. Occasionally you try to search, try to find a fragment that will lead you to its owner, but each time it evades you in an elaborate dance and you give up, defeated.No matter, my love. I am doing you no harm, after all.Of course, you nod to yourself as you walk. The voice is doing you no harm, after all.





	Submersus

**Author's Note:**

> IMPORTANT NOTE: MIND THE TAGS!  
If graphic depictions of death, coercion, manipulation and control will trigger you, as well as self-hatred and self-harm, PLEASE do not read this story. I promise I will not take offence. It is written in 2nd person and so this could become exponentially worse if you already have these as potential triggers. 
> 
> That said, please enjoy my first dip into some horror, as part of the Fairest of the Rare's 'Fairest Freaky Spooktacular' fest. Thank you ever so to Cassie who created the inspo aesthetic I claimed, and all my love to ArielSakura who alpha-beta'd this and made it shiny and beautiful and just more awful (and helped me list the tags!).

You have heard the whisper in your mind for what you think might be months, now. 

It started when you returned to Hogwarts, shamed and demeaned and utterly reviled. It is gentle, unassuming, but always there. A kiss across your brow before you go to sleep, a soft awakening in the early hours of the morning when the night can no longer hold you in its grasp. You think you might recognise it… but every moment the name comes upon you, it has slipped through your fingers like water. Occasionally you try to search, try to find a fragment that will lead you to its owner, but each time it evades you in an elaborate dance and you give up, defeated. 

_ No matter, my love. I am doing you no harm, after all. _

Of course, you nod to yourself as you walk. The voice is doing you no harm, after all. 

You roam the halls alone long before the late autumn sun has risen - not that anyone will talk to you anyway. You have the blackest of marks over your head, you have become a pariah to all. 

You tried to save yourself - tried to save them all. You only wanted to live.

_ At the time. _

You tried to hand over The Boy Who Lived to the Dark Lord. 

It is lonely, so _ incredibly _ lonely. 

_ But you know that you deserve it, don’t you? _

You deserve it all, for what you did. What you did to little children, incapable of defending themselves. What you tried to do to Harry Potter, who, in his own inimitable fashion, saved everyone from tyranny and death under the Dark Lord’s rule. 

_ And you enjoyed it, you sadistic fucking bitch. _

You _ enjoyed _ watching little girls scream and wail, and beg and plead for your leniancy. You absolutely _ loved _ it when the first year boys would run from you; the rush of power it gave you to know you could instil fear in their hearts. 

You raise your hand, curiously watching it when it feels like it is not your own, and drag your fingers across the stones. Their sharp, rough edges dig into your skin, and you feel the sting like a parchment cut at first. But then you claw deeper, and push harder. You don’t want to, but you _ have _ to: because the voice is there again, and it is right. You _ deserve _ this. 

Your skin begins to tear, and you sob, but you cannot stop. Your fists pounds into the raw, unfeeling rock and your palms are ruined as your skin ruptures under your unhinged, brutal punishment. Your mind is in tatters just as your hands are, and you know you deserve this pain. You want to stop. 

No, you _ must _ feel this - must remember what it is that you have done. This is _ nothing _ compared to the rounds of the cruciatus you inflicted on those too young to understand what was happening, let alone why. This is nothing compared to the terror they felt when they saw you twist your wand in idle fingers, when they cringed and shrank back as they heard your footsteps approach down eerily silent corridors. Nothing like how their fluttering heartbeats froze at the pointed raise of your eyebrow. 

You try to argue that you were trapped too - that you hadn’t been happy to do it, that you hadn’t wanted to. Your father had held you at wand-point and told you to obey every command you were given, and so you did. Draco did the same. Millie and Daphne too. You _ all _did the same, in Slytherin, to try and stay alive. 

_ Lies_, the voice hisses, and you stop to pull your hands away from the sharpness of the stone now speckled with the evidence of your personal brand of torture - or at least, you try to. You seem to be unable to pry your fingers from the wall; some invisible force is holding them there in a smear of blood and ruined flesh.

_ That’s enough_, the voice says, soothing, like warm honey and lemon on an aching throat, and your fingers are free. They belong to you once more, and you want to cry at how much it hurts as you cradle them to your heart. _ Enough, lovely. Why don’t you go back to your room and sleep a little more? _

You do, because it seems to make sense and you are so very tired. Why should you bother to do anything else, when no Professor will care if you are missing, and what good will NEWTs do you anyway? No-one will ever employ you. You who only said what everyone else was thinking, and now you pay the price for voicing it. 

_ You who would have hung the Saviour of the wizarding world out to dry. _

You did. You did do that, the voice is undeniably right. You loathe it, because you would have gladly had Harry Potter’s blood on your hands if it meant you survived for just one more day unharmed. Your sluggish footsteps take you back to your dormitory; the bed is a welcome friend to you as you fling your robe carelessly over your trunk and sink into the welcoming warmth of feather and silk.

You sleep for what feels like an age, until a gentle hand on your shoulder shakes you. It is Daphne, her fair hair falling in a silky curtain around her face as she kneels by your bed, asking if you’re coming to dinner. It’s the Halloween Feast. How has the time passed so quickly that the end of October has already met you?

You remove the covers, and nod tiredly. She looks… concerned, as her cornflower eyes rake over you from head to toe. You feel like you are a museum piece on display as she clicks her tongue and tells you that you need to eat more. 

_ But how could that be? No-one really cares about you_. 

It must be a show - a fake. Daphne has always been so very good at pretending to give a damn. No-one really cares about you, after all. She leaves the room, apparently satisfied with her show of good friendship, and you are alone in the candlelit dormitory. 

_ I have a present for you._

Your hand is not your own again as you pull back the covers of your bed, and reach, reach, reach back. And then your fingers touch it, and you gasp softly despite the whisper telling you to remain as quiet as a mouse. 

There is a knife beneath your pillow. Why? What are you supposed to do with it? You don’t want to hurt anyone. 

_ You won’t_, the voice is there again, the little whisper soothing to you. _ Pick it up_, it tells you in the smooth, buttery tone that has become as familiar to you as your own breathing. You take your robes, spread over the lid of your trunk, and slip them on over the delicate nightwear you’ve worn for days and days on end. You slide the knife into your pocket, and it feels oddly comforting as you tread the corridor that leads into the common room. 

When you look at Draco now, he seems to curiously turn your stomach - though you don’t remember how that feeling came to be. You just know that he is entirely _ not for you _. He has stood from his chair where he lounged, catlike, and he is talking with Theo and Blaise; a small smile kissing the corner of his lips. You remember how you once found that smile - his true smile, not the taunting smirk - devastatingly attractive. Especially when he turned it on you. 

_ He is not for you. You don’t deserve him. _

Draco is now laughing outright at something one of the other boys has said, and Theo clasps a hand on his shoulder as he grins. Theo lingers close to Draco’s side where you once stood, but you are happy because they make him happy, and your little voice is absolutely right: you don’t deserve him. You never have - the scion of a great legacy, who made better choices in the end than you did. Even Potter testified for him, saying that Draco had tried to save him and his friends in what little ways he could. 

_ Better than you ever did. _

All you ever did was try to make sure they were all killed. 

Your body is moving, though you don’t recall thinking of going anywhere other than to the Great Hall to eat, and maybe enjoy whatever display the ghosts put on this year. You hope it will be funny, because you can’t remember the last time you actually laughed. No-one even looks at you as you leave the common room. They never do, these days. 

You walk out of the castle, though your stomach is still gnawing with hunger. You wonder when it was that you last ate, but the thought is gone as soon as it comes. Does it even matter, anyway? 

_ It’s a nice night for a walk out to the lake, isn’t it? Everyone will be in the Great Hall, celebrating. You don’t deserve to be there, and no-one will want you anyway. Don’t you think some quiet would be better for you instead? _

You nod, because the voice is right. It’s a nice night for a quiet stroll, after all. It doesn’t matter that you’re hungry - you can always eat later.

_ A beautiful night, indeed_. 

Your feet walk you out towards the Black Lake, and no-one tries to stop you. It is as if they don’t notice you at all, and you’re glad for it. You don’t deserve to be noticed - you’ve done enough to put you in the dubious glare of the spotlight for a lifetime. You stare out at the black water as the last few leaves from the scattered trees fall and swirl around you, and you grasp the knife in your robe pocket a little tighter with your ruined fingers. The pain makes you hiss and more damning dampness coats your lashes, but you remember your punishment. Your reparation for all that you have done, and you don’t let go. You cannot. 

The wind whips your hair and you can feel the dark, greasy strands smack against your face and catch in your eyelashes. You don’t remember the last time you bathed, or even felt water on your skin at all. 

_ You will tonight, lovely_. 

The whisper is too sinister now, and you begin to panic as you see the lake coming ever closer. The ground becomes more rocky beneath your bare feet and your hand tightens on the knife even though you didn’t want it to. You fight it, but your mind is a cage you cannot tear free from. There are bars constricting your every thought, every feeling; dampening them down so that even though they rage inside you like a thunderstorm, they do not show. You cannot act on them. 

You think you hear footsteps behind you but the thought is as quickly dismissed as your thoughts about food. It’s then that the panic rises in your chest, bile churning in your stomach so badly you turn to vomit and thin yellow acid is all that leaves you. You realise with dawning horror that you listened for too long. The voice has taken too much of a hold on your mind 

_ My roots are too deep, you fucking traitorous slag. You should have ignored me, but I’ve got you now. _

You should have ignored the whisper, but it has you now. 

As you walk towards the lake, your feet drag and you try to stop - for a brief moment, you think you might have won. But then there is a hand at your back and you hear the voice again, though you cannot turn around to see the owner. 

_ This way_, it whispers, stern, and you want to cry. You might be, because there are icy tracks running down your face, but you can’t wipe them away. Your arms are firmly glued, trapped to your sides. 

You feel the pebbles under your soles, and they’re painfully sharp, but you cannot stop moving. You are being dragged by your navel towards the lake. You move to take off your robe, the knife you cannot let go of leaving shallow slices in your skin as you unfasten the clasp and shrug the heavy material from your shoulders. 

You step into the water, and your measured paces seem unending. You don’t know how far you must go into the depths, how far is far enough. 

The water is bitingly cold as it swims higher and higher up your body, and you shriek just a little. Your nightwear provides little coverage, but it gains an impossible amount of weight as the water soaks through the thin fabric and turns it translucent up to your hips, where it laps in peaceful waves and ripples. 

You have to stop, and so you do. 

_ Turn around, love _ \- your feet slowly glide through the water, the faint current dancing around your calves as you look towards the shore, towards the castle that is glowing with the light of a thousand candles. You can hear the cacophony of noise from here like a quiet rumble - warm and inviting, but you can never be a part of it. 

You are alone.

You are _ not _ alone. 

You see the boy on the shore, highlighted by the rays of the moon, and you know him. Relief floods you as you try to reach out, to call for help, but the words stick in your throat and your hands do not move from their position by your side. You’ve been silenced, frozen - by a curse or a charm you can’t tell, but the result is the same. Yet instead of rushing to you to offer aid, the boy simply stares - his aristocratic face a mask of bored indifference, his dusky green eyes slightly narrowed. 

You feel your hand, the one not holding the knife, lifting up the clinging, white cotton vest you wear. Your hand is trembling, your lip shaking, but you know you must do it, and so you do until you feel the kiss of cool metal against your skin. 

You are holding the knife against your exposed stomach, and the olive eyes of the boy before you do not change. They don’t widen in a panic - they simply watch intently in an unwavering gaze.

You don’t want to do it. You are trying to fight it with every ounce of strength you have because you _ know _ this feeling now - you remember it from fourth year when the entire class was, one by one, placed under the curse. The feeling that you are trapped behind bars you cannot reach through engulfs you; your actions no longer belong to you, and your thoughts are not your own. 

The icy coldness of the Great Lake creeps up your legs and you try to move, try to run, but they are fixed there - immovable as a statue. You want to beg, your teeth chattering, your face numb with the cold, but you cannot.

You know what’s coming, but you are unable to stop it. 

The knife slides in, terrifyingly sharp, and you double over, an involuntary spasm of your muscles guarding against the intrusion. 

_ Stand tall_, the voice tells you, and a quiet scream escapes your lips as you do. _ Hush, now. You know what to do. _

And you do. It takes two hands, but you start to drag the embedded blade through your stomach. It is hard - so hard: partly from fighting the uncontrollable urge to do it, and the muscle and organs that are battling valiantly against you, to protect you from yourself. You are coughing and spluttering as you do it, sobbing and barely able to take in a breath because it _ hurts_. 

It feels like your insides are being torn out, a hand reaching in with claws that scrape as you hack and hack and hack until there is a slash across your abdomen like a grotesque smile, and blood flows from you like a river into the water around your hips, staining the white cotton a damning red.

The boy is still watching, but now there is something like satisfaction on his face and you don’t understand, because you thought he was your _ friend. _

_ Deeper. _

You’re not sure what he means as your feet stumble on the rocks that form the lakebed, and you traverse deeper until your toes barely touch the bottom. You barely keep your head above the water and you are weakening, ever weakening. Your hair is weighing you down, your clothes weigh you down, the knife - which you _ still _ cannot let go of - weighs you down. The numbness spreads, and you gasp out into the silence of the night.

“Goodbye, Pans.” 

You hear him speak and you know he is watching as you sink. Your legs are unable to hold you upright as the dark redness of your blood stains the water around you in ever-widening rings. His eyes gleam when you cough; something sticky, metallic and wet fills your mouth and drips from the corner of your lips. You choke on the blood as the voice in your head whispers again.

Oh Merlin, that whisper, you think as dread begins to fill you. The voice that has warmed you and coaxed you; that has brought you peace and been your constant companion through your misery. 

_ Not your companion - your end_, it… _ he _ whispers, and then you know. You remember it all, in startling clarity. 

The boy in your dormitory, the hatred in his eyes. 

_ I’ll give Draco your love, shall I? _

His wand held out before him - the memory is darkening at the edges now as your head begins to spin; from the cold or the blood loss, you don’t know.

_ You made a mistake coming back here, Pansy. _

The words in your memory are the same as the ones that now echo in your head, the whisper taunting and gleeful. Your legs no longer support you as you sink below the surface of the water. You try to hold your breath but your throat spasms, muscles clenching and releasing, burning as they fight against your thoughts; against the voice in your mind. 

For a moment you think you have broken it, and you try to push yourself up, to reach the surface that you can see above you - the moon’s rays darting through the water in streaks of murky light. You try to hold your breath for as long as you can, but it is burning - burning and aching and stabbing. The world is black and sparkling at the edges and you can barely think, barely understand what is going on, but you know that _ not _ breathing is killing you as quickly as breathing in water would; as the knife in your stomach _ is _. You try to move your arms, to swim, but you are so weak. 

Weak. Helpless. 

But then you hear it again, the same as you heard it in your dormitory in September. One word, and your lungs follow their primal instincts and breathe in, because there is nothing else they can do - or they _ should _do. 

You cannot scream. The oxygen you need cannot reach your blood, your organs, your brain. You feel nothing but the burning of lava in your throat and lungs, and the acute agony of the knife still hanging in your ravaged stomach. 

You can fight no more, and the black in your vision becomes darker still as you sink into blissful nothing, utterly defeated. 

The boy in your bedroom laughs. 

Theo?

_ You made a mistake coming back here, Pansy. _

_ Imperio_.


End file.
